


woodcutter, cut out my shadow

by phantomlistener



Category: The Hour
Genre: Episode Tag, F/M, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-12
Updated: 2013-09-12
Packaged: 2017-12-26 08:33:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/963844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phantomlistener/pseuds/phantomlistener
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As the world of "The Hour" disintegrates, Lix Storm begins to fall apart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	woodcutter, cut out my shadow

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Federico García Lorca's ["Song of the Barren Orange Tree"](http://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Spanish/Lorca.htm#_Toc485030355).

She measures time in volumes of amber liquid harsh against her tongue.  Dusk becomes evening becomes night in a meaningless parade that culminates in an empty bottle and darkness spreading in through the office, welcoming and protecting, and she doesn't bother to turn on the desk light.  Her world is reduced to the glow of her cigarette, the numbing roughness of her last mouthful of whiskey, and the feeling that control is slowly slipping from between her trembling fingers.

She can sense the empty bottle taunting her from its perch in the darkness and swipes angrily in its direction; it falls, shatters, lies broken somewhere in the wilderness that her office has become, and she buries her head in her hands.

It seems she cannot help but destroy things.

And then there's movement in the hallway, urgent voices, running footsteps that she half-hears below the beating of her heart loud in her ears.  A knock on the door intrudes.  "Miss Storm?  Miss Storm, are you in there?"

It's on the tip of her tongue to tell Sissy to go away but before she can steel her unsteady voice to speak the door's open, sterile light spilling in from the corridor beyond.  "I'm so sorry, Miss Storm," Sissy says breathlessly.  "But it's Mr Lyon.  Outside.  He's been hurt bad and Bel - Miss Rowley, that is - won't stop crying, and-"

Lix holds up a hand, gathers her voice into coherence: "I'm coming." 

Only when she stands up does she remember just how much she's already had to drink.  The walk outside is something of a blur, Sissy's nervous babble a constant at her side, her fingers itching for the cigarettes she left in her office.  She barely feels the chill as they step through the doors and down the steps.

The grass at the front of the building is crowded with people kept at bay by the simultaneous attraction and repulsion of the scene in their centre; she pushes through them uncaring, drawn on by the vivid red of Bel's dress and the low sound of her sobs.

It's almost biblical, Bel kneeling in tears next to Freddie's collapsed body, an illustration from a children's book brought violently to life; Freddie is an unfocused patchwork of bruises and blood and she's seen this so many times, so very many times, that suddenly it's Spain, stifling hot, a patrol round the corner and precious seconds to record the scene.  She reaches unconsciously for a non-existent camera, freezes halfway through the motion as her brain catches up with her actions.

She's still standing there when the ambulance arrives and its shrill siren and flashing lights help to ground her in the present the way Freddie's blood and the look on Bel's face cannot.  Bel hasn't moved from his side, hasn't registered her presence, has done nothing save follow his body blindly into the ambulance as the crowd disperses. 

By the time they drive off, Lix is alone.  She makes her unsteady way back into the building, arms folded across her stomach as if to hold herself together through sheer force of will because if she doesn't find cigarettes and another bottle of whiskey soon then her already-tenuous control is going to disappear entirely.

The darkened rooms and corridors soothe a headache she didn't even realise she had. By the time she makes her way from her own office towards Hector's - he'll have a bottle of something stashed away, she's sure - some measure of calm has descended upon her.

A door opens to her left.  "Miss Storm."

Randall.

No, no, no.  She ignores him, carries on walking.

" _Lix_."

Reluctantly, she turns to face him, meeting his gaze with a fierce stare.  "Don't.  Just don't."

"I was simply wondering whether you required a lift home."

"I'm going to find more whiskey, Randall."  It's a miracle her voice doesn't break with the effort of more than a few words.  "I take it you remember what that is?"

"Indeed.  Haven't you drunk enough already?"

"Oh, piss off."

He raises his eyebrows and the gesture is so familiar, so much a long-discarded memory, that her stability slips away in an instant.  She can't seem to separate herself from the past.  It's right there in his eyes, in the memory of Freddie's battered face, in the echoes of not-there gunshots and orders barked in harsh Spanish.  It's all she can do not to scream.

With supreme effort, she collects herself, digs her nails into her palms, forces herself to focus on Randall's face, on the lines and the greying hair and all the other changes that mark the irrevocable passage of time. 

She breathes.

She breathes and he steps towards her, reaches out his hand, pushes an errant lock of hair away from her forehead.  Puts it back in its place.  His fingers are soft against her skin and she leans into the touch, too tired to argue with herself.  "Randall-"

His interruption is as unexpected as it is sincere: "Come home with me."

She shakes her head, pressing her lips into a thin line to keep from crying.

"Okay."  He drops his hand, looking oddly lost, and the lack of contact leaves her suddenly cold, the fading alcohol in her bloodstream doing nothing to counter her rather desperate need for a cigarette. 

She can't seem to help herself; she closes the gap between them and kisses him.  It's urgent, all lips and tongue, but his hands come to rest at her waist and she's warm again, so wonderfully warm that she cannot help but scrape her teeth along his lower lip, revelling in the reflexive tightening of his hands above her hips as she does.

He is the one to pull away, hands falling away from her at the same time.  "Lix," he says.

"I won't go home with you, Randall.  I won't... _use_ you like that, I simply won't."

He looks momentarily horrified.  "I wasn't suggesting-  That is, I didn't mean to imply-"  He breaks off, shakes his head.  "It was foolish of me not to consider how it sounded."

"No.  No, darling, it wasn't foolish at all."  She summons up an elusive smile, barely there.  "In fact, it might be the first logical thing that's happened all day."

It's all still there in the back of her head, the jumble of images, disjointed Spanish voices, Freddie (beautiful Freddie) lying broken in the darkness....  And if she looks too hard she can see Sofia's trusting face - tiny, perfect Sofia - gazing out at her in innocent judgement.

She stifles a sob.  In front of her, Randall is real, solid, all sharp angles and precise movements and everything she'd thought she'd lost the right to want decades ago.

"Take me home," she whispers.

He nods.

It's a start.


End file.
